TAMPA — At this time last year, Andy Pettitte’s left elbow was barking loud enough that he was shut down after one bullpen stint. The diagnosis of strained elbow didn’t send up any flares, but it was the first sign that something was wrong with Pettitte.

And when he left during the middle of his first spring game after throwing seven pitches, an MRI revealed another strain that landed him on the DL when the season started.

Pettitte blamed the early problems on throwing a breaking pitch before his arm reacted to the trauma of coming out of mothballs. As it developed, the setback was just the first in what would be the bumpiest road in Pettitte’s short but very successful career.

By the middle of the year, Pettitte’s name surfaced in trade rumors even if the Yankees weren’t serious about dealing a 27-year-old lefty for prospects while trying to win a pennant. At the break, Pettitte was 5-7 with a fleshy 5.59 ERA. In the second half, after the trade deadline vanished, Pettitte went 9-4 with a 4.70 ERA. Pettitte topped that off with a 2-0 record and 3.93 ERA in three post-season starts.

Now, armed with a three-year deal worth $25.2 million that he believes shows the Yankees have faith in him, Pettitte is set on returning to the stud pitcher he was in 1996 and 1997. And while two bullpen sessions totaling 20 minutes in which Pettitte has spun just one curveball certainly don’t provide enough data to tell if Pettitte has a big season in him, it’s crystal clear his off-season workouts have put him ahead of the other chuckers in regards to velocity.

“I want to get back to 1997,” said Pettitte, who is 81-46 in five seasons. “To put up a 2.88 in the American League, I don’t know if I know I can do that again but I feel quite sure I can. The key then was that I really had a good change-up and I had a lot of confidence in it. I am going to work and try to get that confidence back.”

Five stints on a Texas mound throwing BP to high school hitters before trucking to spring training have made Pettitte’s two bullpen stints very strong. Throwing in the same group as Roger Clemens, David Cone and Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez, Pettitte is the pacesetter when it comes to velocity.

Yet, Pettitte, whose arsenal includes a cut fastball and a sinking, two-seam heater, believes less is more.

“I hadn’t gotten away from the changeup but when I threw it was way out of the strike zone so therefore, you lose confidence,” said Pettitte, who was 39-15 in 1996-97 with a 3.36 ERA and 30-22 with a 4.46 ERA since. “I have pitched without a change-up the last two years. That’s why the ERA has been higher.”

Pettitte knows only one way to make the change-up behave so that his confidence in the pitch soars. And if that means getting spanked during an exhibition game, well, that’s the way it will go.

“I need to throw it, that’s all there is to it,” Pettitte explained. “I may need to say, ‘Boys, back up today’ because I am going to throw it. The point is to find the plate with it again. If that means going out in spring training and getting shelled trying to throw it while trying to throw a couple of good ones, I can take a positive away from that.”

When Pettitte wasn’t dealt, much was made of Joe Torre’s role in keeping him. However, Torre wasn’t alone. Nobody in the organization wanted to part with the third winnings pitcher in the big leagues in the past four seasons. Nor did George Steinbrenner, who used the situation as a motivational tool on Pettitte.

“A lot of it was in his head, there was a lot going on,” Torre said of Pettitte’s slip from sensational to good. “He over-prepares at times. A lot of times he puts too much emphasis on what he does. He seems nice and relaxed this spring. The contract helps. It tells him we want him around and he feels like he belongs. Physically, he is fine. That being the case there is no reason he shouldn’t be able to win consistently. He has been that kind of pitcher. You look at the number of games he has won and he doesn’t have to take a back seat to anybody.”